The
Democrats had a chance to elect a presidential candidate who was truly
against war. No, not Howard Dean, he was a
political opportunist who courted the progressive vote. He came out
against the Persian Gulf Slaughter under the command of President Bush Jr.
but he was not against the continuance of the occupation. On the other hand
there was a candidate who embodied a
progressive platform on almost every position: Dennis Kucinich. Kucinich
opposes war to the extent of establishing a Department of Peace and a plan
to end the US of Iraq, advocates increased democratization through political
reform and an end to money politics, opposes the death penalty, is for
normalizing ties with Cuba, favors universal health care, and sides with the
worker. Kucinich pledges to repeal NAFTA, increase the minimum wage, and
vows if the private sector won’t produce jobs then the public sector will.

While favoring a multilateral approach, Kucinich,
however, is fence-straddler on the fateful triangle of US, Israel, and the
Palestinian state. While calling for the security of both peoples and
recognizing the rights to statehood for both peoples, Kucinich errs in
equating the suffering of the occupiers with that of the occupied people.
The Jewish state was carved out through ethnic cleansing and racism; it is
difficult to argue that a state can rightfully come about through such
means. Nevertheless Kucinich is likeliest playing to a political audience,
as opposing the Israeli lobby has been a death knell for many a US
politician.

So why
did Kucinich’s campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination never
really get off the ground? Kucinich also took on the media. He proposed
halting the monopolizing trend in the media and returning the airwaves back
to the people. In furtherance of democratization, Kucinich proposed
providing free airtime to candidates for political office. In other words,
Kucinich had the balls to take on the corporate establishment in business,
politics, and the media. Thus it was not surprising to hear ABC Nightline’s
ungracious host Ted Koppel belittle Kucinich as a “vanity candidate.”
Kucinich eloquently responded, “I want the American people to see where
media takes politics in this country. We start talking about endorsements,
now we’re talking about polls and then talking about money. When you do that
you don't have to talk about what's important to the American people.”
Kucinich’s on-air embarrassment of Koppel spurred ABC’s shameful response to
immediately
pull its reporter covering the Kucinich campaign. With little media
coverage and an ignorant electorate Kucinich never really had a chance.

Dean’s candidacy befell the
same treacherous fate as Kucinich. Dean was actually an outsider within the
Democratic Party, who also had the temerity to challenge corporate media
interests. As a result he was savagely attacked in the corporate media and
when the damage was done, his campaign coverage was basically abandoned.

Although John Edwards
remains in the race (as does Kucinich), John Kerry so far carries the banner
as the to-be-anointed Democratic candidate for president.

John Kerry ostensibly has
the approval of much of the Democrat caucus. Yet many political pundits
maintain that there is little difference between the two contending parties
-- they are mainly different shades of pro-corporate political parties.
President Bush and his neoconservative cabal, despite their voter-defeated,
Supreme Court-handed victory in 2000, have acted as if they had an absolute
mandate for a hard swing to the Right. Since Bush represents to some an
electoral aberration that must be eliminated at all costs, they urge that
voters rally behind whoever the Democratic standard bearer is to defeat
Bush. It is therefore incumbent upon voters to investigate just how much
Kerry is distinguishable from Bush.

Obviously there is the
distinction that Kerry didn’t dodge the war in Vietnam and Bush did. It is
hoped that a choice of president wouldn’t boil down to which one served or
didn’t serve in an ideologically-driven slaughter of Southeast Asians.

Mark Hand makes the case that choosing Kerry over Bush
will result in replacing the ideology of the neoconservatives with that of
“progressive internationalism.” This ideology is merely a milder version of
the unilateralist neoconservative agenda. That Kerry holds this ideology is
evinced by his statement straight out of the
New Democratic manifesto calling for Democrats to respect “the
tough-minded strategy of international engagement and leadership forged by
Wilson and Roosevelt in the two world wars and championed by Truman and
Kennedy in the cold war.” (1)

Kerry
also plays into Bush administration war strategist Donald Rumsfeld’s Old and
New Europe distinction. Hand throws doubt on Kerry’s internationalist
intentions as revealed by his citation of Kerry:

I hope by the time you read this book that the
UN has been usefully employed as a partner in the reconstruction of Iraq and
that Jacques Chirac has ceased his foolish rebellion against the very idea
of the Atlantic Alliance. America, which has always shown magnanimity in
victory, should in turn meet repentant Europeans halfway, not ratchet up the
badgering unilateralism that fed European fears in the first place.

Hand
wistfully asks, “John, could you elaborate on what sins the Europeans
committed for which they must repent?”

Bush who
has used constitution-busting legislation and repression to silence dissent
seems to have a partner in Kerry who also takes on the anti-war movement.
Said Kerry, “I could never agree with those in the antiwar movement who
dismissed our troops as war criminals or our country as the villain in the
drama.” Supposedly Kerry is sympathetic to Bush Sr. who once declared, “I
will never apologize for the United States of America -- I don't care what
the facts are.” It seems Kerry would never apologize for the actions of the
US either.

Kerry
pontificated, “As a veteran of both the Vietnam War and the Vietnam protest
movement, I say to both conservative and liberal misinterpretations of that
war that it’s time to get over it and recognize it as an exception, not as a
ruling example, of the U.S. military engagements of the twentieth century.”
Well, the ongoing occupation of Iraq conspicuously points out that Vietnam
(and let’s not forget to add Cambodia and Laos to that undeclared US war)
was not an exception.

Concludes
Hand, “The only noteworthy difference between the two groups battling for
power in Washington is that the neocons are willing to pursue their imperial
ambitions in full view of the international community, while the progressive
internationalists prefer to keep their imperial agenda hidden behind the
cloak of multilateralism.”

Elsewhere
Kerry’s Jewish pedigree was flapping in the wind for all to see as divulged
by his comments on his trip to Israel. (2)

Kerry
iterates the brazenly false canard that Israel is “the only true democracy
in the Middle East,” and therefore, “Americans must be the truest and
best kind of ally.” [italics added] Certainly the indigenous Palestinians
have no electoral input into life under occupation while the foreign
usurpers of Palestinian land enjoy full voting rights as Israelis. What
kind of “true democracy” is built on territorial grab brought about through
ethnic cleansing anyway?

Kerry
says that Americans “must be committed” [italics added] to support
the Zionist dream of Theodor Herzl of achieving “the greatest power of
Israel.” Why?

Speaking
further in support for the scofflaw state of Israel, Kerry pleads, “In this
difficult time we must again reaffirm we are enlisted for the
duration--and reaffirm our belief that the cause of Israel must be
the cause of America--and the cause of people of conscience everywhere.”
[italics added] What can be more unconscionable than backing a group of
Europeans who have forcibly and lethally rid the land of most its indigenous
people, persecute, torture, and kill the remaining people, and wage war
against neighboring countries in defiance of international law and the
international community except for its superpower benefactor?
(3) Together the US and Israel often reject the world consensus and
operate outside international law inviting scornful reproach. There is a
seeming intent upon extending the apogean boundary of evil.

As the
CounterPunch
editors astutely point out, “[T]here’s scarcely a dime’s worth of difference
between the major political candidates of both parties on the life-and-death
issues of our time.”

As
horrible as Bush is, the unthinking outright rejection of third party
candidates is questionable. There is a photo on the
home page of the Dissident Voice website featuring a banner with Herren Bush and Hitler.
Under is the caption that might equally well apply to a photo of Kerry and
Bush: Same shit different asshole!

Kim Petersen
is a writer living in Nova Scotia, Canada. He can be reached at:
kimpetersen@gyxi.dk.
References